OLLI at Auburn University

Tag Archives: 2014 Spring

Our medical systems are broken. Doctors are capable of extraordinary (and expensive) treatments, but they are losing their core focus: actually treating people. Doctor and writer Atul Gawande suggests we take a step back and look at new ways to do medicine — with fewer cowboys and more pit crews.New →Books by Gawande, Atul

Drug-resistant bacteria kills, even in top hospitals. But now tough infections like staph and anthrax may be in for a surprise. Nobel-winning chemist Kary Mullis, who watched a friend die when powerful antibiotics failed, unveils a radical new cure that shows extraordinary promise.

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August 29, 2014. Superbug NDM could ‘change face of healthcare’ experts warnA study by Public Health England found that most bacteria carrying the NDM enzyme were resistent to the ‘last resort’ antibiotics.Only one drug, from the 1950s, remains effective against infections carrying New Delhi metallo, and it will soon become resistant to that as well, researchers said.….….

NDM-1 stands for New Delhi metallo-beta-lactamase, which is an enzyme produced by certain strains of bacteria that have recently acquired the genetic ability to make this compound. The enzyme is active against other compounds that contain a chemical structure known as a beta-lactam ring. Unfortunately, many antibiotics contain this ring, including the penicillins, cephalosporins, and the carbapenems.

This PBS program, first aired in October, 2013, is available for viewing online, It will be re-broadcast on Tuesday, March 6, 2014 on APT. The Frontline website also has the latest on the nightmare bacteria, superbugs, and related issues.

Data and statistics, effectively displayed, can inform us about the world and our condition. They can also be used to control us, i.e., determine what we see on the internet, what shape our worldviews. Today’s discussion leader with be Auburn faculty member (and Linda’s husband), Chris Shook.

As web companies strive to tailor their services (including news and search results) to our personal tastes, there’s a dangerous unintended consequence: We get trapped in a “filter bubble” and don’t get exposed to information that could challenge or broaden our worldview. Eli Pariser argues powerfully that this will ultimately prove to be bad for us and bad for democracy.

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How can we measure what makes a school system work? Andreas Schleicher walks us through the PISA test, a global measurement that ranks countries against one another — then uses that same data to help schools improve. Watch to find out where your country stacks up, and learn the single factor that makes some systems outperform others.

Healthcare Statistics

Abstract: The Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD) tracks and reports on more than 1,200 health system measures across 34 industrialized countries. This analysis concentrated on 2010 OECD health data for Australia, Canada, Denmark, France, Germany, Netherlands, New Zealand, Norway, Sweden, Switzerland, the United Kingdom, and the United States. Health care spending in the U.S. towers over the other countries. The U.S. has fewer hospital beds and physicians, and sees fewer hospital and physician visits, than in most other countries. Prescription drug utilization, prices, and spending all appear to be highest in the U.S., as does the supply, utilization, and price of diagnostic imaging. U.S. performance on a limited set of quality measures is variable, ranking highly on five-year cancer survival, middling on in-hospital case-specific mortality, and poorly on hospital admissions for chronic conditions and amputations due to diabetes. Findings suggest opportunities for cross- national learning to improve health system performance.

Some people fancy all health care debates to be a case of Canadian Health Care vs. American. Not so. According to the World Health Organization’s ranking of the world’s health systems, neither Canada nor the USA ranks in the top 25.

Published on Apr 1, 2013. One afternoon, Kees Moeliker got a research opportunity few ornithologists would wish for: A flying duck slammed into his glass office building, died, and then … what happened next would change his life.

March 14, 2014. A federal judge slapped down the FAA’s fine for a drone operator, saying there was no law banning the commercial use of small drones.
The judge’s decision could open up the skies below 400 feet to farmers, photographers and entrepreneurs who have been battling the FAA over the use of the unmanned aerial vehicles.

This week we introduce you to TED-Ed Lessons Worth Sharing.We can use engaging videos to create customized lessons, adapting
and editing any lesson featured on TED-Ed, or or creating lessons
from scratch around any TED or YouTube video. You can take theTED-Ed tour to watch the video and learn how.

AU’s 2014-15 Common Book. We will also introduce you
to William Kwamba’s How We Built A Wind Mill.

Questions of good and evil, right and wrong are commonly thought unanswerable by science. But Sam Harris argues that science can — and should — be an authority on moral issues, shaping human values and setting out what constitutes a good life.

At age 14, in poverty and famine, a Malawian boy built a windmill to power his family’s home. Now at 22, William Kamkwamba, who speaks at TED, here, for the second time, shares in his own words the moving tale of invention that changed his life.

Harris’ words [in his 2004 book The End of Faith] are indicative of a profoundly anti-intellectual conceit that holds an alarming amount of influence within contemporary scientifically motivated atheism.

William Kamkwamba is the subject of a new documentary, William and the Windmill, which made its world premiere at the SXSW film festival on Sunday, March 10. It is up for the festival’s Documentary Competition.